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Most of the greenfield operators are looking at managed services. Since
cost-effective rollouts are in focus, greenfield players want to focus on core
business such as commercial strategy, branding and subscriber base expansion,
thus achieving a sustained and high network performance with fewer resources.
With this, operators can provide end users with more satisfying services,
enhancing customer loyalty.

Aircel, which is expanding rapidly, and Unitech Telenor have given their
managed services business to Huawei. Most of the managed services players
provide end-to-end solutions, including network design and build, network
operation and maintenance, and network transfer back to carriers, as per the
needs. This helps carriers to easily provide services to end-users with less
operation cost.

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Huawei Technologies and ZTE, two leading Chinese technology vendors, are flexing
their muscles to grab maximum attention. Prominent vendors such as Nokia Siemens
Networks, Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, among others, are also not lagging behind.

Managed services, according to Huawei, is an important step in meeting
customer requirements, and it provides operators with all or part of the
outsourcing services for their network operation and maintenance.

According to Rajeev Weimin Yao, senior corporate VP and executive director,
corporate affairs, India operations, Huawei, the company's managed services
realize their commitment towards network performance through application of
service level agreement, and key performance indices. "Huawei's global
experience has enabled the company to deliver over forty managed services
projects for international operators like Vodafone, China Mobile, MTN, Etisalat,
Warid, and other famous multinational operators with excellent services," he
adds.

"We have a rich experience in global managed services, including multi-vendor
network management, human resource transfer, assets transfer, etc. Additionally,
Huawei has a mature work-flow for network operation and maintenance; and an IT
system that is based on eTOM," he says.

In India, Huawei has managed services engagement with operators like Aircel,
Bharti-Airtel (for its Sri Lanka network), Tata Teleservices, Unitech-Telenor,
to name a few. Huawei, which has a network operations center (NOC) in Gurgaon,
with structured circle level services and delivery local presence, combined with
a three level PMO organization, is able to provide seamless managed services to
its customers. The company also has robust network swap capabilities, which is a
value addition to some of the established operators who are looking for
technology upgrades in a smooth migration and evolution path.

ZTE is also expanding in India. It has recently established its first managed
service center in India. According to the company, it is the largest national
network operator center outside China to deliver a unified management platform
for Indian telecom operators.

It was set up with an initial investment of $4 mn. The NOC will showcase
ZTE's engineering capabilities to telecom operators in India and is in line with
the company's strategy for achieving leadership in the Indian telecom market.
Located in Gurgaon, the NOC employs over 200 people, 80% of whom are localities.

The Gurgaon NOC is integrated with ZTE's global customer support center (GCSC)
in China and local customer support center (LCSC) in Bengaluru, India in order
to support, collaborate, and provide back-up to each other. Geared with latest
equipments and technology from ZTE, the NOC will provide a unified management
platform that will help in lowering the TCO for Indian telecom operators. While
Tata Teleservices being the first operator to utilize the services of NOC, the
Chinese technology vendor will eventually connect all its customers in India to
the center.

"India is the key focus market for us, and establishment of the NOC showcases
our commitment to the development of the telecom market in the country. Not only
will it enable reduction in the total cost of ownership for existing customers
by providing them with a unified management platform, but will also help
showcase our world-class engineering capabilities to new prospective customers.
The NOC platform will be the gateway to next generation managed services for our
customers and help us consolidate our leadership position," says DK Ghosh,
chairman and managing director, ZTE Telecom India.

The NOC will provide multiple services to telecom operators in India, with
the aim of reducing their total cost of operations and maintenance costs by
eliminating unwanted operations. Some of the key services provided by NOC will
include utility network management system (UNMS), that provides different
service management as per the needs of different operators; resource management
system (RMS) that enables efficient management of network and business
resources, and electricity maintaining system (EMS) for effective duty
management, etc.

The NOC will play a pivotal role in showcasing its ability to enable
integration from multiple carriers, and provide real-time monitoring of the
entire network infrastructure for an operator. It will provide an analysis of
the network capacity from both business and a customer's viewpoint, and
establish service level management to meet customer requirements by establishing
processes and service support models. The NOC will also enable faster and
efficient rollout of networks, thus making it possible for new operators to
start commercial services quickly.

Baburajan K

The author was hosted in China by Huawei Technologies

baburajank@cybermedia.co.in